Breakaway
by unwritt3n xx
Summary: Hermione's life starts to get more interesting when she finds herself fawning after the two most desired wizards at Hogwarts. But when she chooses one...what if she still wants the other? And will those two stop at nothing to keep her for themselves?
1. Chapter One

**Breakaway**

**By:** Credit for writing the first chapter goes to _MysticalSpirits_, but the rest will be by me.

**Disclaimer:** Harry Potter is the property of J.K. Rowling and Warner Brothers.

**Chapter 1:  
****Grew up in a small town**

**:-:-:**

**A** girl of nearly seventeen years placed her bare foot on the first carpeted step, starting to make her way up the staircase. The plush feeling beneath her toes gave her comfort, but this went mostly unnoticed, as she was used to the reaction by now.

She slowly and sleepily strode up each step one by one. It was late (although not even close to as late as those all-nighters she experienced each year), and she was expected to wake up quite early in the morning to catch her train to school. It was so late that even her parents were already in "Dreamland" up in their room. Knowing this, the teenager sighed.

This tired and worn-out girl was Hermione Jane Granger, also known as "The Bookworm," and/or "The Pesky Mudblood", and/or "The Gryffindor Know-It-All." And this Gryffindor girl was, at the moment, on the verge of unconsciousness.

She would always wonder why it was that she always went to bed so late.

Her studies, of course, but she obviously completed her bundles of homework before a week of the summer holidays were up, so that wasn't the reason of her sleep deprivation. Not to mention that she had already caught up entirely on knowledge she wouldn't even learn at school, as well as information she wouldn't necessarily need. She was well prepared, and she knew it well enough to take it easier for her last and final year at Hogwarts.

Her books outside of studies might have been a good explanation for her tiredness, since after reading and rereading all her books a countless amount of times, she went to the library to read others. But, no, that couldn't have been it either, as she usually just went down to the small library to read rather than checking books out with her card. She didn't want to bother carrying a stack of books back and forth from the library to home, since she was forced to walk there and back. Her parents were busy working on their dentistry business and she had not been able to take a drivers class while away at school, therefore causing her to parade around town. But, surprisingly, this simple exercise paid off in another way, causing her to lose some extra pounds that made her look slimmer than she felt.

Perhaps even the telly caused her to sleep later and later. Hermione had taken a sudden interest in the worldwide news from a Muggle's point of view, and she had taken the liberty to lie around on the couch to watch the never-ending programmes. But even she knew that staying up later and later every night just to watch a different news show would not change what the weather was like within five minutes or what the latest movie star named her newborn baby. So, therefore, the television did not make such an impact on her sleeping schedule.

All the same, Hermione had been retiring to her bed later and later each night. And this particular night was no different.

She did all she could to carry herself upstairs, but she eventually gave up the on the effort (quite surprising, as she was an over-achiever), and curled up into a ball on a step in the middle of the staircase, immediately falling into a deep, dreamless slumber.

**:-:-:**

**H**owever deep that slumber was, it wasn't deep enough to keep Hermione asleep the whole night, although she was extremely tired.

Not only did her eyes hurt from lack of rest, somehow alerting her that she had large bags under them, but her back ached from the uncomfortable position she remained in for nearly four hours.

Slowly and shakily getting up, Hermione rubbed her aches as well as she could, ready to depart up to her _real_ bed. However, as soon as she stood and stretched, she was wide-awake, and as much as she wanted to sleep again, she inwardly knew it wouldn't happen for quite some time.

Because of this, Hermione knew she could waste a few minutes quenching her miniscule thirst with water from the kitchen. She softly crept towards the said room, but halfway down the hall she paused to study something on the wall.

There on that wall was a small yet noticeable crack. Hermione smirked to herself, yet wincing slightly, remembering how that crevice in the plaster came to be.

**:-:-:**

_July 17, 1986._

"**E**mma!" six-year-old Hermione cried in her young, high-pitched voice, "Give that back!" She ran as fast as her short legs could carry her, her older sister, Emily, jogging away. In Emily's hand was (surprise surprise) another piece of Hermione's large collection of books, more specifically, the classic **War and Peace**.

Emily just laughed at her younger sister, "No way! You can't even _read_ this stuff!"

"Yes, I can!"

"Cannot!"

"Can so!"

"Cannot!"

"Can so!"

"Nuh uh! You just look at the pictures!"

"There _are_ no pictures in that book!"

"Are you serious?" Emily jogged slightly slower, leafing through the pages of the book she hadn't even picked up before that moment. Just as Hermione (or "Minnie" as she called her) had said, no pictures decorated the thin pages. "Then why in _bleeding_ hell do you read this stu--"

"_Emily Mae Granger_! Don't you use that language around this house!"

She sighed at the use of her full name, crossing her fingers. "_Yes_, Mum!"

"Aha!" cried out a triumphant voice.

Emily turned to face Hermione, who had just snatched her book out from her very own hands. She supposed that with all the fuss over the pictures and the swearing, she had unknowingly halted the escape plan.

Hermione giggled happily. "Yay! I win,_ Emma Mae_!"

Emily scowled at the use of her nickname. "Nuh _uh_, Minnie Jane!"

Hermione frowned. "I'm not mini! Mummy says my size is just perfect!"

Emily snickered. The whole family knew how small her sister was for her age, but the young girl was so keen on becoming taller that she convinced herself that she was just right. She had even tried to cheat when her father measured her on the wall by standing on the tips of toes.

"That's not what I meant," Emily giggled. "I was just saying your _name_."

"What?" Hermione asked confusedly. It was a wonder how she could read such advanced text, do such advanced math problems, and use such advanced words, but somehow not understand the difference between her size and a nickname. As soon as the girl thought a bit longer until reaching the conclusion, a look of understanding brilliantly reflected on her face.

"Oh, I get it now!"

"Sure you do," her sister teased.

"I do!"

"No, you don't!"

"Yeah, huh!"

"Nuh uh!"

"Yeah, huh!"

"Nuh uh--"

"Girls!" their mother cried from the kitchen.

The two sisters bashfully looked at each other from the shame of getting in trouble, but the embarrassment soon wore off at their smirks.

"Nuh uh," Emily whispered.

"Yeah, huh," Hermione said softly back.

"Nuh _uh_."

"Yeah, _huh_."

"Nuh uh!" Emily started arguing even louder.

"Yeah, huh!" Hermione cried mockingly.

After a few more shouts of the teasing, the two eventually felt as though they had to beat the superiority out of each other, and they leapt up in a chance of winning the small battle. They did not act as though they were two young boys, engaged in a fistfight, but they, instead just continued to wrestle playfully but forcefully, as they just felt the sisterly urge to make the other feel downtrodden first.

Their mother heard the racket they were making, and in a few seconds time, she had made her way to the hallway by the stairs. Looking in on the fight, she yelled at them motherly-like to get off of each other, but the continuous argument still took place, drowning out the scolding of their elder.

Unfortunately, Hermione was still holding her heavy book during all this, and as she tossed and turned away from her sister, she flung her book back and forth, every so often hitting Emily in the shoulder with it.

Emily, however, being the ten-year-old she was, was not a baby and did not fancy crying out in any sort of pain. But the unfair blows did eventually annoy her, finally pausing for a bit to grab the book away.

"Hey!" Hermione cried. "That's mine!"

But Emily ignored the small pleas, harshly and forcefully throwing the heavy book at the wall right beside their mother. Their mother _did_ move to the side, thankfully, but the book lost a few pages and paid the wall with a grateful crack.

Hermione stopped the fight, getting up, and stared longingly at her precious novel. She turned to face her guilty-looking sister, her eyes welling up in baby tears.

"Thanks a lot, _Emma Mae_!" she cried. "Now my book's **War and _Pieces_**!"

**:-:-:**

**H**ermione, once again sixteen years old, shadowed in darkness, glanced at that memorable crack, smiling slightly at the funny times she had had in the past.

She and Emily got into a whole mess of trouble that day, their mother screaming her head off at nearly having a heart attack, not caring much about the destroyed book that she didn't really approve her youngest of reading in the first place.

All the same, Emily _was_ entitled to buy her a new copy of the book for her birthday, something that her sister didn't mind at all about.

Hermione sighed quietly into the night. Emily, now at twenty-one years of age, was away at college in America training and studying to be a film director. Two out of the four years of studying was up, and although Emily could've come home over the summer to visit her family, she had stayed behind for a summer program to help her with her life-long dreams.

Hermione missed her dear "Emma Mae" more than most other things. She hadn't seen her for almost two years, and it pained her to not talk about her at Hogwarts for those many years, frightened as the war crept closer and closer.

But now the war was indeed over, Voldemort on the non-prevailing side, and Hermione was no longer bound to the fact that she was putting her Muggle family in danger. All the same, she still could not bring her close sister into her magical life, since she knew how her friends' reactions would be like if she started to talk of it.

"A _sister_?" Ron would cry. "Why didn't you tell us you had a _bloody_ sister?" Of course, he would lengthen that short sentence with a much more colorful strand of words, not failing to mention that Hermione couldn't be as trusted as everyone thought if she couldn't even tell her best friends about her _sister_.

"Hermione," Harry would say as softly and reassuringly as he could, "why wouldn't you just tell us? We would've understood, and you could've counted on us to keep the secret if you need us to." Yes, devoted, trustworthy Harry. But of course, it wouldn't be too hard to see the hurt in his striking green eyes, the look of friendship slowly but surely leaking away. He would be trying to comfort her, but she knew that it just wouldn't be right, as he would still not know fully well her meanings of her secret sibling, nor understand what a danger it could be if someone had overheard of her.

"Oh, my gosh!" Lavender would cry. "A _sister_? Why didn't you say so? We could've fixed her up or bought her robes to hide her identity…maybe some nice rosemary ones…" Of course Lavender would have connected the situation with fashion in some way, but she just didn't know the right moments to be serious or joking. She was smart in a certain aura, but she wouldn't have known that the clothes wouldn't cover her sister up as much as expected.

"But," Ginny would say hesitantly, "Voldemort would have…I mean…_surely_ he would know about your sister anyway, as much as you tried to cover her." Hermione supposed she was right, but Ginny couldn't have known that even the smallest things, such as speaking of her sister, could have triggered an attack, or that the slightest protection _would_ certainly help somewhat.

Hermione knew her friends well, and she knew that they would just be doing their best to support her. They were very good and loyal friends, but she also knew that something as big as not telling them about a large part of her family was so crucial it would hurt them tremendously, and that was something she did not plan to do.

Deep in these thoughts, Hermione had somehow reached the kitchen that was so familiar to her. She had quickly but quietly gotten the water she wanted and gulped it down in no time at all. She casually placed the empty glass by the sink, making sure to keep it safe from breaking just in case Crookshanks leapt up onto the counter later in the night.

Tiptoeing softly once more, Hermione made her way past the living room, turning a corner to head up the stairwell. Sliding her hand on the banister, she looked up slightly, but kept her gaze down to her feet in fear that she would trip and wake up her parents with the noise.

After finally ascending her way to the top of the stairs, Hermione did her best to walk even lighter and more carefully, as she was nearing her parents' bedroom. When she _did_ reach it, however, she stood still, right in front of the cracked open door. She took one step closer to her parents, standing right in the middle of the doorway.

She watched her parents, at the moment looking quite like big blobs of shadows. She couldn't clearly see their features, but she had memorized their faces and she could imagine them well enough to "see" the shapes' appearance.

Her mother was lying on the side of the bed closest to Hermione, allowing her to study her not-so-clear figure. She was a pretty woman, but wasn't all that shocking to look at. _Which would explain me, I suppose_, Hermione thought to herself.

Her mother was slim, but definitely did not have a model figure. The clothes she wore _did_ look as though she was a housewife (according to her, of course), but when she went into her dentist's office, she looked extremely sophisticated and not one to cross, reminding Hermione sometimes of Professor McGonagall.

Her father, on the other hand, was quite different. He was a handsome man, with a round face, but a body that showed his hard work at the nearby gym. Of course, many others didn't recognize his looks, as he surely looked older and like a father with his round glasses and his graying hair.

But his patients loved him and weren't at all as afraid of him as they were of his strict wife. He would crack jokes in the office and give small, cheap toys to his child patients after they were done with their appointments.

Hermione remembered that one time when she came to visit her parents in their office. She was about eight at that time, young, energetic, and still just as short. How else was she supposed to act in a small office like that one, let alone with…_him_ there?

**:-:-:**

_August 4, 1988._

**H**ermione was eight years old now, her hair already a bush of tangles and her brain already filled with more knowledge than the others in her Year 3 class. It was because of her strong intellect that she made a fool of herself so badly that day…

She had come to visit her parents, as she was bored out of her wits (an impressive thing, actually) at home and had nothing left to do but read, something she was somehow tired of that day.

As soon as she entered the small waiting room and closed the door, she knew something was wrong. She looked up, as she was so short she couldn't help but do anything otherwise, and she saw someone she knew, someone who she wanted to see more than anything, yet someone who she wanted to leave her forever.

"Simon?" she squealed in fright, her cheeks already turning cherry red.

The blonde boy looked at her, smiling charmingly but tauntingly. "Hey, Tumbleweed," he laughed at her, his voice spiteful.

Hermione blushed harder, but she expected the biting comment. Like the others at her school, he made fun of her constantly, both of her looks and her boring intelligence.

Since she met him in Year 1, she had had a large crush on him, although it was obvious he didn't feel the same about her. Nevertheless, she felt a desire for him (but not a specifically strong one, as she was at such a young age still) when he called her by his name for her: "Tumbleweed", given because of the shape of her hair.

"What're _you_ doing here?" the little girl asked shyly, her hands wringing behind her back and her head faced towards her feet, although her eyes were on him.

"Parents," he rolled his eyes, still giving the girl a scornful look. "And what about _you_, Tumbleweed? Are your parents having fun drilling people's dirty teeth? But I guess that doesn't matter to you; they've just brought the dirtiness home so often it doesn't make a difference anymore, eh?"

Hermione really did look down at her feet this time.

"Aw…looks like it _is_ true, eh, Tumbleweed?"

"No, it's not!" she squeaked, easily offended as she was so young. "Mum and Dad are _doctors_, and they clean up after _every_ patient so they don't carry germs…that's why they wear gloves and sterilize the--"

Simon scoffed in his arrogant way. "Whatever, Tumbleweed! Only a little bookworm like you would've read up on stuff like that, or at least read an excuse book like those ones my father bought me."

"I didn't read an excuse book!" she cried. "It's _true_, it is! My parents told me so and--"

"Do you always believe in things your parents tell you?" Simon laughed. "_I_ don't, and I still get whatever I want."

Hermione fumed. "You're _spoiled_, Simon, just _downright spoiled_!"

He just chuckled. "Yeah, but I _still_ get whatever I want, so I don't care."

She looked around the room so she didn't have to set her eyes on Simon, who was still her crush for some strange reason. The room was completely empty, and her parent's secretary who would usually watch for entering patients had gone to the loo, and she was not present.

Just the thought of being stuck alone in a room with Simon made her shiver, but with him being so arrogant, her anger was building up faster and faster. The heat in her head grew and grew, and she glared at him, or rather, the vase right beside his head so as not to make eye contact. Her head felt so hot, her face red, no doubt, that she got a severe headache that boiled her blood. She glared at the vase harder…harder…with more and more anger built up inside her…

It was at this moment that the vase shattered. Simon ducked in surprise and cried out, as even an eight-year-old boy would do. His arms automatically moved up to cover his head, and the broken purple and pink glass spread out everywhere, the white lilies inside it falling to the floor.

Hermione cried out as well, giving a loud gasp, and she ran into the back room of the building where her parents were cleaning Simon's mother's teeth.

"Mum!" Hermione cried. "Dad!"

"What is it?" her mother asked nervously, her father putting the cleaning brush on a tray, but not before turning it off, of course. Simon's mother sat up curiously.

Hermione didn't know what to say. She _didn't_ know what happened, so she came up with the only possible thing that must've happened. "It's Simon, Mum!" she cried. "He broke your vase!"

**:-:-:**

**H**ermione continued to make her way to her room in the dark. She grimaced at the old and embarrassing memory.

She remembered that day clearly, and the more she thought of it, the more she regretted things that she'd done.

She hadn't known then that she was a witch, and breaking apart that vase with her angry eyes gave her a small sign that something was weird, but she was young at that age and brushed it aside…until she was eleven and received her Hogwarts letter, of course.

When she went back to school the month after the incident, Simon had stayed away from her. It was her fault, they both knew, that he had gotten a strict talking-to from both her mother and his.

Thankfully, however, he did not mention their meeting to his friends, but everyone continued to taunt her until the summer after Year 5, since she had gotten her letter at that time.

Speaking of Simon _and_ Hogwarts, he was never forgotten, although the crush towards him was. But there was someone _from_ Hogwarts who reminded her of him, and that someone was the one and thankfully only Draco Malfoy.

Now that she thought about it again, it _was_ a strange thing, all the things they had in common. They were both exceptionally mean to her, called her a certain name that was hers and only hers, rich and spoiled, not to mention blonde, and would do anything to put her, her family, and her intelligence down.

Hermione turned one last corner and tiptoed her way into her room. Even in the dark, she could see the pink walls and hangings on her four-poster. Since she had been away at school most of the year, she had never bothered to clean it up or repaint it. It wasn't like anyone except her family and Felix would see it anyways.

She walked to her bedside carefully as to not hurt herself by things that might be in her way, picking up a picture standing on a nearby table.

In it was a girl, in her teens, and a slightly older boy, both hugging each other as if they would never let go. The girl was Hermione, obviously, and the boy…the boy was her neighbor and closest Muggle friend, Felix.

**:-:-:**

_June 21, 1993._

**T**hirteen-year-old Hermione sat outside on her front porch, reading **Hogwarts: A History **for what seemed to be the hundredth time. Of course, she knew that she wasn't supposed to advertise the magical world, and she decorated the cover of it so that it looked like just another ratty old book. Besides, when she got to Hogwarts, she could just fix it using magic, as she wasn't allowed to do so during the summer in a Muggle town.

She was waiting outside her house for a certain reason, not just to read with her book in disguise. The "For Sale" sign on the house across the street was covered now, with the word "Sold" in large red letters, overlapping the original phrase.

There was a low rumbling of a lorry, and Hermione put a hold on her readings of the Astronomy Tower's construction to look up at the movers and the new family. She watched as an old car with tinted windows parked in front of the house, leaving just enough room for the moving truck behind them.

She watched as a young-looking middle-aged lady and a mustached man climbed out of the front seats of the rusty automobile, but after they closed the door to speak with the movers and no one else came out, she had lost all hope that there was someone her own age in her neighborhood to talk to.

But her heart leaped when she saw the back door open, and a boy who looked to be slightly older than she stepped out and smiled straight at her, noticing the girl.

The boy was tall and tanned, his brown hair bleached at the tips and spiked up slightly. She had to admit that he was rather good-looking, but for some reason, she just wasn't interested in boys as the other girls, both Muggle and magical, were. Sure, there was Simon, but besides him, and that one time she had liked Harry, she just had no interest.

But the boy _did _catch her attention, and she put her book down at a porch table and skipped across the street to him and what were probably his parents.

"'Lo, there!" she said casually but politely to the older folk. "I'm Hermione Granger, from across the street. Welcome to our neighborhood! Do you need help with anything…?"

**:-:-:**

**H**ermione crawled into her covers, placing her head on her pillow, but she did not sleep immediately. She remembered that day clearly, as if it occurred just the day before.

That was the day she met Felix, an American Muggle from New York City. She had offered to help out with the boxes, and at a moment when both she and Felix were inside the same room, she had noticed an awkward silence. She wasn't one to socialize, but she knew she had two options: to stay quiet or to make conversation. She knew that she had been doing the former for quite some time already, and she finally decided to do the latter.

She and Felix started to talk more and more since then, as she came over every day that week to help he and his family out. Eventually, the formalities between the two relaxed, and by the time that summer was over, they were extremely close.

Since that day when she met another one of her best friends (again a male, which she thought was a bit ironic) she had visited Felix every day when she came home from school, unless of course one of them was on vacation or something along those lines.

Speaking of which, she had said a long goodbye to him just a few hours ago (another reason why she was becoming more sleep-deprived), but she knew that whether she was running late or not in the morning, she would spend another few minutes at the least saying goodbye to her dear friend.

With this on her mind, she thought about Hogwarts. It was her second home, she knew, but tomorrow she would be leaving to go to it, something she'd been waiting for since she left.

But...but was she ready? Was she ready to leave her Muggle friends and family behind? All those memories? No longer freely talking to her sister on the phone? No more trips to the dentist's office to relive past experiences? No more late-night news programmes on the telly? What would it be like going back to school...as a Seventh Year?

'_This is silly_,' she thought, cuddling into her blankets, '_I_ love _Hogwarts, and no matter_ how _homesick I'll be, I'll still be home in our world...with Harry and Ron, Ginny and Lavender...and with_ magic.'

With these thoughts, Hermione filled her brain with endless possibilities of this next year without Voldemort, with fewer worries, and with the same amount of students as before, maybe even more (as the teachers, students, and families that were killed in battle were brought back for their efforts in the war once "Tom Riddle" was destroyed). At school, they were allowed to explore around places they'd strangely never seen, until curfew, of course. They were brought to Hogsmeade at times, and the classes there, according to Hermione, were wonderful and mostly exciting. And all those adventures she and her friends went on every year...

These thoughts became overwhelming, and her usually strong mind grew tired, also from her weakness from her lack of sleep. And it was then that she closed her eyes, drifting slowly into unconsciousness, her dreams filled with memories.

And this time, she _was_ sound asleep, and there was no chance that she'd wake up again before she had to go on that train and depart from her home, this small town…


	2. Chapter Two

**Breakaway**

**By: **unwritt3n xx

**Disclaimer: **Harry Potter is the property of J.K. Rowling and Warner Brothers.

**Chapter 2  
****And when the rain would fall down:**

**:-:-:**

**H**ermione awoke the next morning, with a bad discomfort in her neck. "Mmmm…" she moaned groggily. She was still tired from staying up the night before and having countless dreams that kept waking her up in the middle of the night, along with the rain pouring outside. She got up from her bed, and made her way towards the windowsill. When she looked outside, she saw something so expected, but something so unique at the same time. A tree. But it wasn't just a tree. It was the exact place where she had found Felix by, on a day exactly like this one; cold and rainy…

**:-:-:**

_July 16th, 1995_

**F**ifteen year old, Hermione Granger was cooped up in her room, once again reading the infamous **Hogwarts: A History**. She sighed audibly, and sat the book aside once she had finished reading it for the umpteenth time. She had actually read all the books in her room (which happened to be a lot) at least twice already that summer, and as ridiculous as it may sound, she was getting incredibly bored of reading them.

She stood up and sighed once more while she was heading across her room to go downstairs and watch the telly, something caught her eye. She turned and found herself in the direction of her windowsill. When she had reached it, she saw something so close, but at the same time, so far away. It was him. Felix was facing a tree, and looked like he was admiring something. Hermione knitted her eyebrows in confusion, grabbed her jacket, and headed outside, completely forgetting that she was about to watch one of her favorite pragrammes on the telly.

Once she had reached the bottom step of her porch, she felt drops of rain slap across her face, and felt a slight chill roam through her body. She quickly pulled her hood over her head (she didn't want to make her hair anymore frizzy, now did she?), placed her hands in her jacket pockets, and scurried off towards her best Muggle friend, Felix.

When she finally had reached her destination (which happened to be a pretty long way), she stopped beside Felix, put both hands on her knees, and panted so loudly, you could still hear her through the pouring rain.

Felix looked at her a bit amused and with a slight smile on his face. "What are you doing outside in weather like this, Miss Granger?" he asked teasingly, while enjoying a silent laugh.

Hermione looked at him, disapprovingly, and said, "I should be asking you the same question," in her notorious bossy 'know-it-all' voice.

Even though Felix had never once been to school with Hermione, he knew all about her studious habbits. School was actually one of the things she told him about the most (but she, of course, skipped the part about the magic). The others were Harry and Ron. When he had first heard about them, he did get a little visit from the green monster of jealousy, but he soon grew accustomed to it, because Hermione had always assured him that all they would ever be were best friends. Not that Felix was 'in love' with her or anything. He was just really protective over her. Ever since they had first met, she had been the little sister he had never had, and vice versa. He would just have to get over that a couple of other guys thought of her as a sister, too.

Felix chuckled softly at her comment. _'Good 'ole Hermione, back in action, I see!' _he joked to himself. "Well, my dearest Hermione, I might just admiring my wonderful artwork that I have finally finished after hours of hard work," he said, while waving at the tree with his hand.

Hermione furrowed her eyebrows, while wiping a few raindrops off of her cheek, and turned to face the tree. There, on the bark, were the carved initials, "HG + FB." 'HG' of course, for Hermione Granger, and 'FB' for Felix Belcinee. She smiled, while absentmindedly licking a raindrop off her bottom lip. This was actually the most creative thing he had ever done; he wasn't a very artistic person. She looked over at him and saw him holding the blue pocketknife she had give him for his birthday the year before…

**:-:-:**

**H**ermione smiled at the memory. She had never really enjoyed the rain…until that day. She used to find it so annoying and disturbing, but now she found it so tranquil, and so difficult to miss out on! _Especially _since that day with Felix. Oh, how she was going to miss him.

Did she really want to lave her home to go to Hogwarts for another year of school? _'Oh, no! Not these thoughts again! Of course I'm going to Hogwarts again this year! I desperately want to see Harry and Ron again, and I really miss using my wand--'_

"Hermione!" her mother's voice rang through the house, cutting off her thoughts. "You need to hurry if you're going to say goodbye to Felix one last time and _still_ make it to Diagon Alley on time to meet your friends!"

"Okay, mum! I'll be down in a minute!" She had completely forgotten her thoughts when she had heard that she might be late for meeting up with her friends. I guess she was going to school after all.

**:-:-:**

**A**fter Hermione had gotten dressed and ready (she had packed her trunk with school uniforms and old school books a couple of days before), she ushered herself out of her room and almost tripped while coming downstairs with her trunk.

"Whoa, slow down there!" said Hermione's father, who had walked in just in time to catch Hermione before she fell.

"Sorry, dad. Just a bit excited, I guess." Hermione laughed nervously.

"Excited, huh?" Her father, Henry, asked suspiciously, while Hermione raised one eyebrow in amusement. "Are you sure there's not some _boy _you want to meet?" he accused. Hermione looked at him, utterly shocked. Was this her father? I mean, she was seventeen for Merlin's sake!

"Henry!" her mother, Jane, snapped, while looking at him with that 'don't-you-dare' look Hermione always uses.

"What?" her father inquired. "I was just curious."

Her mother rolled her eyes and looked at her daughter. "Got everything?"

"Yes, but have either of you seen Crookshanks?"

Jane was about to answer, when her husband spoke up suddenly. "I have, but I'll only tell you if you tell me whether or not you're getting excited over some boy!"

The two generations rolled their eyes simultaneously, and sighed. Yes, this is where Hermione had gotten her Miss-Priss attitude.

"No, dad," Hermione said like it was the most obvious thing in the world. "I'm not getting excited over some guy."

Her father let out a breath he didn't know he had been holding and said, "Good, 'cause if you were, I would've hunted the guy down and beaten him to a bloody pulp."

"But, dad, I'm not, so can you pl--" Hermione stopped in mid-sentence and thought about Ron and Harry. "Uh...on second thought, there's Harry and Ron, but they're just my friends, so there's nothing to worry about. Now could you please tell me where Crookshanks is at?" she asked, impatiently.

"Are you sure?" her father inquired.

"Yes, dad, I'm sure! Now could you please tell me where Crookshanks is at? You're wasting a lot of my time!"

"Um..." her father paused. "He's right there." He pointed at Hermione's feet.

Hermione made and 'o' shape with her mouth, picked him up, and started petting the big fur-ball, while putting him in his cage.

"PMS?" Henry muttered to his wife.

"You bet'cha," she replied, muttering back.


End file.
